A 59-year-old Chaparral widow, brutally attacked as she slept on a March night in 2013, said she has trouble sleeping in her own home now.

Her attackers, she said, took about $72 and her wedding and high school rings before driving off in her new truck.

Otero County Sheriff's Deputies quickly recovered the truck, but the woman said what she wants back the most are her rings.

"Those are priceless for me," she said, adding that she was just trying to do a nice thing when she hired one of her attackers to do yard work for her.

Twelfth Judicial District Judge James W. Counts on Thursday sentenced one of the woman's assailants, Justin Riley, to 30 years in prison — the maximum — for one count each of first-degree kidnapping, second-degree aggravated burglary and third-degree aggravated battery. He had pleaded no contest to the charges.

The state dropped several other charges as part of a plea deal, according to court records.

Riley said he was sorry and has taken responsibility for what he had done. He said he wants to better himself and learn from the experience.

Assistant District Attorney Matt Wade said Riley — and a juvenile also convicted in connection with the attack — split the woman's head open, tied her up and stuffed her into the bathroom, barricading the door with her mattress.

"She had to get staples in her skull. They left her just bleeding in the bathroom, tied up, arms and feet," Wade said. "She had to push her queen-sized mattress off the door and crawl out before she could get the things off her hands."

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Wade said the two also stole an old computer and a 12-pack of soda before leaving in the victim's truck, which she had recently purchased with her late husband's life insurance money.

He said Riley is believed to have participated in the burglary to raise money for his then-unborn son. Wade asked for the maximum sentence at Thursday's hearing. He hoped that it would send a message to the criminal element in Chaparral, particularly teenagers and young adults, that Riley wouldn't be getting away with his crime.

Defense attorney Todd Holmes said it was a "horrible" case but an easy argument to recommend Riley be sentenced to the maximum allowed under the law.

He added his client wouldn't be getting away with anything because he faced a mandatory long prison sentence.

Holmes asked Counts to mitigate Riley's sentence down, in part because of his youth, which he added was no excuse to go out and commit crimes.

"Justin really never had a chance," Holmes said. "His mother didn't raise him right, and I don't think this lengthy prison sentence is going to do anybody any good."

Counts said it was a difficult case because he held in his hands a "substantial chunk" of a young man's life.

He said it gave him pause to consider the maximum sentence but added that there is a woman who was extending kindness and now is afraid to sleep in her own home.

Counts commented on the loss of the rings, saying that little keepsakes and mementos are often the hardest to lose as they remind someone of another, better time.

"Those meant something to her," Counts said.

Counts said he could not mitigate the sentence, and that Riley's response to fatherhood worked against him.

"You had a choice," Counts said. "You made a choice and now you get the consequence."

Wade said sheriff's deputies, who quickly brought Riley and the juvenile into custody using the GPS device inside the truck, have to deal with a portion of the population in Chaparral "who think that they can do just whatever they want."

"It's a beautiful community down there," Wade said. "A lot of people choose to live down there because of the culture, because their families grew up there."